The Men in Black

I can tell you one thing, it’s not Tommy Lee Jones or Will Smith. Men in Black (MIB) are men dressed in black suits claiming to be government agents who attempt to harass or threaten UFO witnesses into silence. It is sometimes implied that they may be aliens themselves.

The term is also frequently used to describe mysterious men working for unknown organizations, as well as to various branches of government allegedly designed to protect secrets or perform other strange activities. The term is a generic one, used to refer to any unusual, threatening or strangely behaved individual whose appearance on the scene can be linked in some fashion with a UFO sighting.

The phenomenon was initially and most frequently reported in the 1950s and 1960s. The archetypal Men in Black encounter was alleged to have occurred in 1953, when publisher Albert K. Bender asserted that he uncovered the secret behind flying saucers, but had been threatened by three men who wore black suits and hats. Initially, Bender clearly implied the men were U.S. Government agents, but his later accounts blended supernatural features with UFO lore. In fact, Bender himself was initially skeptical of the Men in Black phenomenon and first encountered them “in the flesh” after publishing an account of the Maury Island Incident, which occurred in 1947 when Harold Dahl reported pieces of a UFO fell on the boat he was on in the Puget Sound, killing his dog. The next day Dahl was warned by a man in a black suit driving a black 1947 Buick that he would do well to keep silent about the incident.

Early reports of Men in Black often described them as men short in stature with swarthy complexions, as if they were deeply tanned. Some reported them as Gypsies. Sunglasses, black suits and black cars have been a feature for the entire period since modern sightings began in 1947, but according to UFO historian Jerome Clark, “All MIB are not necessarily garbed in dark suits.”

According to the accounts of those reporting encountering them, Men in Black always seem to have detailed information on the persons they contact, as if the individual had been under surveillance for a prolonged period of time. They have been described as seeming confused by the nature of everyday items such as pens, eating utensils or food, as well as using outdated slang, though accounts on the behavior of Men in Black vary widely. Accounts indicate that they often claim to be from an agency collecting information on the unexplained phenomenon their subject has encountered. In some cases they are said to use unidentifiable instruments to wipe the memories of their subjects clean, which is unlikely because of the very fact the subject remembered it. In other accounts, they seem to be trying to suppress information by, for instance, trying to convince their subject the phenomenon never existed. They have been described as behaving in either an exceedingly furtive manner or a completely outgoing one, with wide grins and disconcerting giggles. In the UFO research community the Men in Black often claim to be from the Air Force or the CIA. Those who have encountered them say they produce identification, but when verification is later sought, the people described either don’t exist, have been dead for some time, or do exist but have a different rank.

Some ufologists believe that Men in Black are in fact either aliens or androids controlled by aliens. According to this theory, they are sent out in order to cover up alien activity on Earth. All oddities in their appearance and behavior are explained by the Men in Black’s extraterrestrial origin and their unfamiliarity with norms of the human society.

More prosaically, Clark cites Bill Moore, who asserts that “the Men in Black are really government people in disguise and are members of a rather bizarre unit of Air Force Intelligence known currently as the Air Force Special Activities Center (AFSAC). As of 1991, the AFSAC, headquartered in Fort Belvoir, Virginia,” and “under the operational authority of Air Force Intelligence Command centered at Kelly Air Force Base in Texas.” Curiously, Moore also reports that AFSAC was inspired by the tales of Men in Black from the 1950s, and had nothing to do with those early accounts. Similarly, Clark notes that Dr. Michael D. Swords has speculated that the Barker/Bender Men in Black case (occurring shortly after the CIA-directed Robertson Panel issued its recommendations to spy on civilian UFO groups) might have been a psychological warfare experiment. On a more practical note, most US government law enforcement and intelligence agencies such as the FBI have strict dress codes that ordinarily require their members to wear suits in dark, non-obtrusive colors.